


The Easy Things Are Never Easy

by Rynfinity



Series: The March of the Damned [16]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Abusive Parents, Abusive Relationships, Alternate Universe - Human, Hurt/Comfort, Light BDSM, Light Bondage, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Sibling Incest, Substance Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-16
Updated: 2014-08-18
Packaged: 2018-02-13 11:32:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2149149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rynfinity/pseuds/Rynfinity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Normally Loki would relish a free half hour but today he just hadn’t been able to tolerate it.</p><p> </p><p>This is a direct sequel to <i>Can Wounded Birds Fly Anew, or Must Their Pasts Forever Drag Them Down?</i> and will make the most sense read after its predecessors. </p><p>This story takes place in the same AU and timeframe as <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/1583402/chapters/3363989">Dreams</a> from <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/series/104813">Out of the Mouths of Babes</a>; unlike the Babes stories, this one is told from Loki's point of view.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Talking about the past has a bit of fallout. Still, things go better than they sometimes have.

He looks frantically around the brightly-lit activity room. It's basically the classroom, if you will, where those who are a little less _artistically inclined_ go for their therapeutic handicrafts. Consequently Loki’s pretty much never been in the place, not since his first couple days’ exploring.

There is no one around, which is probably good.

There is also nothing the least bit interesting to do, which isn't.

~

That he’s in here at all is thanks in very large part to a series of unfortunate coincidences which – taken together – are starting to feel dangerously personal.

For starters, Loki had forgotten - thanks to the whole shitshow about Odin - that Dr. Riley was going to be offsite this morning. He’d barely slept and had limped through his morning routine - shower, breakfast, car service (he's been walking home from the center for a while now, on the days he and Thor have nothing time-sensitive to do, and his brother would probably trust him to walk _there_ as well... but Loki is not an up-and-at-'em person and the morning ride buys him a few more precious minutes to drag his feet and try to get himself more or less functional) - with ringing ears and racing heart, keeping it together (only, and barely), by reminding himself he could see her first thing.

Yeah, no.

According to his daily schedule, picked up on the fly at the main counter as if everything was normal (even though nothing was), he wouldn't be seeing her until lunch.

He'd held everything together through DBT, managing to dodge getting called on largely because he hadn’t been together with his normal classmates. The instructors weren’t people who knew him; he’d been able to conveniently hide behind the more talkative of the other participants. By the end of the class he’d realized hadn't heard (or, at least, absorbed) a thing.

Not that it really matters... the program is all about repetition anyway, and Loki’s own class has already covered this particular topic. He thinks he probably listened last time; he usually does. If not, he’ll doubtless get to sit through it again sometime.

DBT had finished up a little too early for lunch. Normally he would relish a free half hour but today Loki just hadn’t been able to tolerate it. He'd tried to go to the library but _that_ had crashed and burned... he’d been unable to sit still or concentrate, and was instead dangerously close to hopping up and pacing frantically. Frantic pacing in the library is bound to draw unwelcome attention, so he hadn't, but just barely. It had taken less than ten minutes before he'd been ready to climb out of his own skin.

After that he’d headed a couple of halls over to the fitness center, hoping to find an option that might safely take the edge off whatever was going on in his fucked-up head. It probably hadn’t been a bad idea, actually; it’d just failed what it came time for execution. He'd caught a foot in the waistband of his shorts and stumbled, though, and had netted himself a blown-out crotch seam. This might not have been an insurmountable problem except that 1) he was totally not wearing the right underwear for this particular turn of events, not in public, anyway and 2) when he poked his head in the door there was a yoga class going on.

Loki had hovered on the doorstep for a long moment, debating. Ultimately, faced with the distasteful choice between shocking an entire class with an eye-level view of green lace thong and giving the whole thing up as a bad idea, Loki had opted for bailing. "I'll just come back later," he'd told the instructor as she'd asked if he was okay, "after I get some lunch. I was going to do speed drills on the bag; that's loud and I don't want to disturb everyone. No, it's fine, really," he'd assured her as he'd backed quickly into the locker room.

He’d had a little tantrum once the door closed. It hadn’t helped. Punching a locker would have been far too loud, and ripping the offending shorts to shreds hadn't turned out to be nearly as satisfying as he'd expected. It had been stupidly depressing, really; he'd _liked_ those shorts and, had he only left the stupid ripped things the hell alone, the original damage would have been easily enough mended.

Loki had given up at that point and stomped back to the lunchroom, where people were just starting to trickle in. Unsurprisingly, because it was clearly a shitty karma day, the sandwich people had been out of his favorite mustard. He'd gotten oil on his sub instead, but they’d used too much and it was too slimy and everything had kept shooting out of the roll and onto the plate. By the time he’d given the whole thing up as a bad idea, there’d been oil everywhere. His hands had been dripping.

At home with Thor it would probably have been funny; here, on a day like today, it had only managed to be embarrassing. Especially when someone from group had wisecracked about it being Loki's first day with the new mouth. He'd literally growled then; the guy had wisely opted for another table.

To top it all off, there had been fucking nuts in the brownies.

Loki likes nuts well enough, sure, and he likes (too much; far, far too much) brownies. He very much _does not like_ the two things combined into one.

He’d spit a half-chewed bite back onto his plate, then flung the defective brownie’s remains the better part of a table away. The whole thing must have looked like an accident somehow, as it hadn't drawn any of the staff’s attention.

A couple of clients _had_ seen it, though, and had laughed. He'd growled at them, too.

At 12:43 PM he’d leapt out of his chair and hurried – as close to running as he’d estimated he could pull off without getting in trouble - to Dr. Riley's office, hoping against hope she'd gotten back early.

Of _course_ she hadn't. In fact, "she's running about half an hour late," one of the aides had told him when he’d trotted over to the desk to inquire. "Why don't you go find something to do nearby - in Activities, maybe? - and I'll come get you when she's ready."

~

So, here he is. Loki looks around at the empty room a second time and then a third, searching desperately for something - anything - to keep his mind busy.

It takes less than two minutes to determine that sudoku... doesn't. It's only one of stack of those _take one for your personal enjoyment_ workbooks, though, not a real book. Consequently Loki feels barely any guilt whatsoever when he rips it to pieces and flings the resulting bits of paper and brightly-colored card stock everywhere.

He shreds another, and another and another, one right after the next in quick succession. Around the seventh copy the thrill wears off. Loki stalks around the paper-scrap-littered room, hissing and growling to himself and looking for something else to destroy.

Pencils. Charcoal sticks. Small paintbrushes, the handles snapped and the heads ripped off with his teeth. Crayons, flung hard enough to mark the furniture.

It isn’t until he grabs one of the folded wooden easels - it's flimsy, not like the nice ones in the art studio, and he hates it like he hates himself – that Loki screams. Right about the same time, when he has the thing up in a loose batter's stance but has not yet swung, the door opens. It's the aide, peeping out from behind one of the guards.

"Loki," the guard starts, voice soft. That’s as far as he gets.

Loki slams the easel two-handed into a heavy metal worklight, sending the thing crashing to the ground.

It’s deafening. Glass shards fly everywhere, in what feels like slow motion.

Glass.

Shards.

The guard takes one step into the room and then another. Loki dives for the closest chunk of glass, heedless of both his still-healing wrist and the sharp mess that was once a floor. "One step closer and I'll do it," he snarls from where he's sprawled gracelessly, the glass poised just above the inside of his left wrist. "Just. Fucking. Don't."

Behind the guard he can see the aide backing away.

Dr. Riley materializes in the doorframe, eyes narrowed. "Easy, Loki," she says in her normal voice. "You're okay. You can get past this."

His breath catches. "You don't know that," he howls. She doesn’t. He doesn’t. Even Dr. Riley can't fix _everything_.

"You're right," she says, crouching down by the guard's boots. "I don’t know it. But I believe it. You're okay, Loki. I've got you."

Loki lets the glass fall. It pinches a little as it hits his wrist and then drops harmlessly off to the side.

He dissolves into huge, awful sobs.

"May I come over and sit with you," Dr. Riley asks politely.

"Uh-huh," Loki between howls. He curls onto one side and balls up, knees to forehead. Bits of wood and glass catch at his clothes and scrape his skin as he moves.

He can hardly feel them.

~

For a long time she just crouches a few feet away, talking him quietly through the breathing exercises he normally knows by heart. She doesn't move, save to shift her weight occasionally, until his chest has stopped hurting and the screeching in his ears has nearly faded.

When Loki is finally able to haul himself into a sitting position and wipe his nose on his sleeve, Dr. Riley sits as well. She crosses her legs and picks a chunk of glass out of her shoe. "We're good," she twists and calls to the guard over her shoulder. "Thanks, man. I’ll catch up with you later."

The guard closes the door, gently, on his way out.

Dr. Riley turns back to look Loki over. "May I," she asks, holding out one hand. "You have paper in your hair."

He laugh-cries a little. "Mm," he agrees. "I'm pretty sure I have paper in my everywhere."

She pulls it carefully loose and lets it flutter free. Afterwards she surveys the mess around them, smiling. "Clearly sudoku was no match for you today," she acknowledges, and Loki almost manages a laugh. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to be here earlier," Dr. Riley tells him, serious again. "I should have had someone else check in with you and make sure you were okay."

Loki snorts. He picks a shattered bit of pencil out of his sleeve and drops it on the floor. "I hate to burst your bubble," he finally finds it in himself to tease her, his voice still thick and raspy from crying, "but this wasn't about you."

Dr. Riley smiles again. "Oh, I hope it wasn't. My partner would be awfully annoyed."

They share a laugh and he feels the crushing weight of _being Loki_ lift, just the tiniest of tiny bits.

~

"Can you give me a quick outline of what's wrong," she asks him once they've both stopped laughing and are just sitting quietly again, "so I can get an idea how to best help you?"

"I-," _don't want to talk about it_ , he almost says, because _that_ always works so well. "We just found out that Odin knows where I am," he says instead, feeling his chest tighten again. "He called Thor." He stops there, hoping to avoid the rest.

"And?" Unlike a lot of people she never falls for any of his evasive maneuvers, which is at once the best and worst thing about her.

Loki sighs loudly. "And after that we talked about some shitty past stuff, Thor and I. I freaked," he adds, pretty fucking unnecessarily given the sorry state of the room.

"Did you and Thor argue," Dr. Riley asks him, concerned.

Loki smiles again, a little sadly this time. "No. Not at all. He was actually really supportive. It- it was just too much for me, I guess." He shrugs. Another piece of pencil falls from somewhere near his shoulder and bounces off his thigh.

~

They talk some more. She's not pushing like she often does, which Loki greatly appreciates. The fresh glue holding his head together wouldn’t be up to that; it hasn’t yet had time to cure.

Eventually Dr. Riley stretches like a tattooed little cat. "What do you say we move this to my office," she asks, "and let the guys clean this place up?"

Loki nods, then _really_ looks around. "Fuck," he huffs. "I'm sorry."

She grins. "No need. It's kind of what this stuff is here for."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Progress, and kittens.

It all starts with the trained therapy animals.

The organization that supplies them – the animals, and their handlers – sends dogs, cats, and a giant, floppy grey-and-white rabbit to the center twice a week. The whole menagerie is there around lunchtime, from later in the morning until early afternoon, and interested clients can stop by the rooms (there is one set aside for dogs and another designated for cats, because some clients are afraid of and/or allergic to – or just plain don’t like - one or the other; the rabbit tends to end up out in a little alcove off the main hallway, a cozy nook with a couple of leather chairs and some magazines) for a little pet loving.

~

Loki and his brother didn’t have pets, either dogs or cats, as children. He isn’t exactly sure why; he remembers asking for one several times, but invariably getting put off with what he now recalls as vague, meaningless excuses.

As the two of them got older, things started to unravel and the idea of a puppy or kitten faded into the background; Loki knows he spent his early adolescence increasingly self-centered, secretive and withdrawn. Then, too, by that point he was too busy stalking Thor to spend much time thinking about anything else anyway.

~

So many choices, all of them furry! Over the course of a couple of weeks Loki gives all three spaces a test drive. The dogs are certainly friendly and loving, but they’re a little too busy and a little too fawning in ways he can’t quite put his finger on. He does generally enjoys his time with them but he finds himself comes out a little more tense than he went in, which is probably not the idea.

The rabbit, he really likes, but it doesn’t seem to like _him_ ; after their first encounter, during which it delivered a pinching bite to Loki’s hand that made him jump and squawk, the rabbit takes to peeing on him. Its (his?) handler is apologetic – “He never does that,” she exclaims, horrified. “I don’t know what’s gotten into him!” – and that just further cements Loki’s concern that he’s enjoying snuggling the rabbit at the soft (but cranky) creature’s expense.

Something about that feels wrong, and he avoids the rabbit nook thereafter.

The cats, though, are perfect. They come to him like rats to the pied piper when he’s sad or upset, their little faces creased with what he can easily pretend is worry, but getting one to actually stay on his lap means learning to calm himself quickly and thoroughly. Nothing makes them leap off like being fidgety or noisy. If Loki can still himself and just sit there, as relaxed as possible, they settle onto his thighs – sometimes two or three at a time, if he picks the right chair – and snooze. If he’s extra-lucky they purr contentedly.

He’d been warned that cats nip, sometimes hard – Sif and her family had a pair when he and Thor were kids, although her parents rarely let the boys play with them (because Thor was too rough and, when it came to their friends’ parents, Loki got painted with the same broad brush as his did his brother more often than not) – but these don’t. He supposes that’s part of being trained therapy animals, but he can’t help but be a tiny bit disappointed.

He thinks he’d like them even better if they were a little less flawless.

~

In the spirit of _being careful what you wish for_ , Loki and nine of his fellow clients – “cat people” who’ve been deemed stable enough to take part without endangering themselves or their furry fellow subjects – are selected to help with an experiment. One of the dietitians runs what Loki learns is termed a cats-only, no-kill animal shelter across town, and some of the center’s therapists – Dr. Riley among them – are doing research. In short, they’re seeing how certain types of high-functioning, essentially non-violent clients with BPD, attachment disorders, and anxiety spectrum disorders (and Loki can’t help but wondering how he falls in the high-functioning, non-violent pile after his recent attack on Activities) respond to kitten socialization.

The kittens are young and feral – the kittens of feral cats, or of strayed housecats, that have spent their first few weeks living in the wild – and people from the shelter are on hand at all times to help direct everyone.

They (the kittens, not the shelter people, though that would be rather funny too) do nip. In fact, screw that; the little furballs outright _bite_.

Loki likes the idea that the feral kittens and feral people get to socialize each other.

He also really likes the kittens. There’s something deeply satisfying about getting a tiny ball of fur that’s too scared to come out of its cardboard box to eat – voraciously, like it’s never eaten before and may never eat again – food off a little baby spoon _you’re_ holding.

Even better, he gets to wear a kitten to lunch (in a small nylon vest that’s kind of like a baby carrier, the sort that cuddles the baby against the wearer’s chest) as long as he eats in the quiet dining area. Quiet dining is a small room off the main lunchroom that’s meant for people who need to get away from chaos; it’s not somewhere he’d sought out normally, because it limits his ability to behave badly (see: fling nut-infested brownies) without being caught. It’s worth behaving like a grown-up now, though, to avoid scaring his kitten.

In fact, attempting not to act out at all – to keep himself peaceful and his heart rate normal – feels a lot more worthwhile when it’s less about behaving and more about _not scaring the kitten_.

~

“You have a knack with the little guys, don’t you,” Dr. Riley observes after a few weeks of Operation Feral-Fixing.

Loki nods. He can feel his face getting hot. “They like me.” He has to look away. “I’m not used to anyone liking me for no reason.”

“You’re very patient with them, and very quiet,” she tells him. “Everyone from the shelter who’s been on-site here has mentioned it.”

He shrugs, still not really looking directly at her. He has a longstanding love-hate relationship with being the center of attention, and it’s more than a little weird to be caught in the spotlight accidentally.

It’s even weirder to be there because he’s doing something _good_.

“Loki,” Dr. Riley asks gently, and then waits until he makes eye contact. “You like them?” She watches his face.

“I do!” Thinking about the kittens, he can’t help but smile. This is easier. “I really do. And I like it that they have a good chance at going to happy homes because of me. Because of us.”

She smiles back. “Then I have a proposition for you,” she tells him. “You know our feral program is just a study. It’s not something we can implement long-term at this point; we really need to thoroughly evaluate the amassed body of research – if there is such a thing; this idea may be pretty new - before we even begin to consider how we can approach our board. But the shelter people have asked,” she goes on as he frowns unhappily – he doesn’t _want_ this to stop, _just a study_ or no - “if you in particular would be interested in helping them out at their kennel a couple of nights a week. It would just be for an hour or two each time, and you’d be able to leave here a little early those days because the whole thing would be considered a work program.”

Loki is- he’s speechless. “Me,” he finally manages on the third or fourth try. “But- why?”

Dr. Riley nods. “You, yes, and for all the reasons we just covered: the cats like you, and you like the cats; the shelter people are impressed. You’re good at this, Loki.”

He can feel himself tearing up. He’s not sure he’s ever been good at something _meaningful_ before. “Um.”

“Listen, I don’t want you to give me a definitive answer now,” she tells him. “Think about it for a day or two, and then we’ll talk about it again.”

“But I,” he starts, because he _knows_ he wants to do it, and then stops. “Okay, sure, you’re right. I’ll think on it.”

She smiles. “Good. And do me a favor, will you?”

He raises his eyebrows.

“First make up your own mind and only _then_ \- if you want to, I mean – discuss it with Thor. I’d like you to go through the exercise of deciding what you want to do completely on your own. Can you do that for me?”

Loki nods. He can. He really hasn’t mentioned much of anything about the therapy animals at home anyway, although he did tell Sif about the peeing rabbit. Plus, _he knows he wants to do this already_. “Yes,” he tells her when she just sits and looks at him. “I can. I will.”

~

Of course, it ends up being the proverbial elephant in the room. The minute he gets home and hugs his warm, powerful brother, all Loki wants to talk about it is the shelter.

He doesn’t. He gave Dr. Riley his word.

That, and there are kittens depending on him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are looking up, and looking scary.

After a nice enough dinner with Sif and Steve, Loki and Thor sprawl companionably – just on the short side of _stuffed_ , and the particular kind of drowsy too much giddy socializing brings – on the sofa. Loki knows he could fall asleep without half trying but, first, he has a job to do. “We should talk about this afternoon,” he tells his brother.

~

A few hours earlier, long enough after lunch but quite a while before they’d had any reason to need to start getting ready for dinner, Loki had tried an experiment. He knows from personal experience that having an opportunity to hand off responsibility – for thinking, even – can be a relief… especially when your brain has latched onto something you’d just as soon it hadn’t.

Like this shitty dream Thor’d reported having recently, the one where Loki’d evidently died a horrible death.

That’s all he’d meant by the whole thing with the handcuffs and the blindfold, honest – he’d just wanted to give his brother a chance to experience setting everything aside for a few minutes and simply _feeling_ \- but their scene (because it _had been_ a scene, whether Thor knew it or not) had somehow turned into something deeply sexual.

Not that his brother had complained, and Loki certainly hadn’t. Wasn’t. _Isn’t_. But Thor hadn’t quite been himself all evening, just the same.

Loki hasn’t topped – really topped, not the silly crap he and his brother have gotten into here and there – since- since before Lila died.

But that’s no excuse for shirking his responsibilities.

~ 

Thor groans, deep in his chest. “Do we have to,” he asks, in the same tone of voice he normally reserves for sulking about cleaning the bathroom.

“We should,” Loki says, because tonight it’s his turn to be the grownup. He takes his brother’s hand and laces their fingers together. Thor doesn’t understand any of this, after all, despite several game attempts to laugh about it over dinner. “I need to make sure you are okay,” he explains quietly, shifting a little so he can really see his brother’s face, “and I want to know what you did and didn’t like so I can do a better job next time. Unless, of course,” he adds sheepishly when Thor just stares blankly at him, “you didn’t like any of it and there isn’t going to be a next time.”

His brother blushes. So… it’s not that he didn’t like it, then. Good to know. “It was- really intense, I guess,” Thor offers after an awkward pause. “And I feel weird, still. Weird about it, and just weird.”

Loki knows exactly what his brother means. Thor probably won’t want to hear that, though. “If I tell you that’s normal,” he asks instead, relieved to find his brother’s big fingers still warm and relaxed in his own, “will you believe me?”

“You said you’d done it before, often,” Thor says rather than really answering. “Was that while you were- um- working?”

He can feel himself tensing. He’s careful not to let his fingers give him away. “Well, no,” he says cautiously. “Are you sure you want to hear about this?”

While he knows he hides that, too, Loki can’t deny that he’s surprised when his brother nods.

“Between the nuthouse and getting arrested,” he tells Thor, “a friend of mine and I used to do it. It really wasn’t sex, even,” he clarifies, in case that’s somehow an issue; right now he’s trying to calm and comfort his brother, not start up over who’s allowed what sort of leeway. “We were both in kind of a rough place. I didn’t know how to put words to it then, but doing things like that… it was a way for me to process the emotional pain.” Which is of course what gave him this idea to start with. Loki keeps that bit to himself.

“What happened to your friend,” Thor asks him. It’s not like either of them couldn’t see this coming.

“She died,” he says quietly. “Not like you’re thinking, probably,” Loki goes on before his brother can jump to unfortunate conclusions. Can start drawing ugly parallels. “She was in a car accident. Well, a bunch of us were. Some were just luckier than others, I suppose.”

Thor clears his throat. Loki reaches over with his free hand and gently cards through his brother's messy golden hair, fingers scooting up from the nape and working carefully outwards. "What," he asks after a minute or two, as it's painfully clear from both expression and body language that Thor wants to ask him something.

"Was- was _she_ -," his brother starts, making a spinning gesture with one hand.

"Lila," Loki supplies, wincing because saying her name tonight hurts just as much as it always does. "Her name was Lila."

Thor nods. "Lila,” he says, like he’s testing it on his tongue. “Was Lila your girlfriend?"

Loki smiles crookedly. "No." He points at himself, sock-covered feet to head and back. "Gay," he reminds his brother. "Not bi. Not by choice, anyway," he amends; hookers fuck whomever they're directed to fuck. Or, well, vice versa. Still, Algrim tried to be good about that, and Thor doesn't need to hear Loki's sordid tales of woe just now anyway. It’s not what they’re there for, for once. "She was my- my landlord's, I guess you could call him - the dude who gave me a place to stay after the nuthouse – anyway, Lila was his sister." He makes himself push on before his brain hops into its usual rut and shows him all the blood. "We were just good friends. Our play was only R-rated for language and nudity," he adds with a soft laugh. Talking about Lila is something Loki always has to fake until he makes it.

"Nudity," Thor echoes a bit dully. “Play.” He sounds as though none of this is adding up for him somehow. 

"It's safer to strike skin you can see," Loki explains. "And we weren't exactly in any position budget-wise to be stocking up on fancy fetish-wear."

Thor yawns and scrubs at his face sleepily. Loki really hopes his brother will be able to get some decent rest tonight. "Was he - Lila's brother - your boyfriend,” Thor asks with another yawn. “Excuse me.”

"Oh hell no," Loki exclaims, skipping completely over the apology. Scott was his jailer and his torturer. "But he did collect the rent as though he was," he clarifies, trying hard not to be dishonest. "I wasn't in any position to say no." He braces himself for Thor to start in on some version of _you should have called._

Instead, his brother catches his hand delicately at the wrist and kisses it. "I'm sorry you had to go through that." Thor kisses his hand once more and sets it gently back where it came from. "I bet it sucked."

"Mm," Loki agrees. Algrim was a peach by comparison. None of that is anything his brother needs to know. "How are you feeling?"

Thor yawns again and nuzzles Loki's arm. "Sleepy. You just might be magic, you know," he says.

"Mm," Loki hums again. "Let's get you to bed, why don't we?"

~

"He slept a lot better afterwards," Loki tells Dr. Riley more than a little proudly on Monday morning. "I thought it might help him." He shrugs. "I guess it did."

She smiles. "How do _you_ feel," she asks, steering him not-so-subtly back on track.

"Good," he tells her. "It felt good to not be the one _needing_ help for a change. Ooh ooh," he nearly shouts as he remembers there’s _more_. "I made my decision about the shelter, too. First, before I told anyone." He makes himself lower his voice, mostly because he feels abruptly idiotic. "I'm going to do it. Everyone was pleased. Thor will even give me a ride home," _unless you're getting ahead of yourself, you sentimental shithead_ , he reminds himself, feeling his stomach plummet like a free-falling elevator car, _and they’ve changed their minds_. He takes a deep breath. "If the offer still stands, I mean." He steels himself for what's bound to come.

"It most certainly does," Dr. Riley exclaims, and _oh thank fucking baby jesus_. "I've had three people call me about it already, just since Friday.” She grins at him. “All that aside, I'm really happy you've decided to give this a try."

She genuinely looks it, too. He tests out a timid little smile. "Me too."

~

It all goes surprisingly quickly.

The work program paperwork is waiting for him at the main counter between lunch and DBT, accompanied by a nice man all set to help him complete it. Loki feels pretty fucking ridiculous, frankly, because who in this millennium gets to such a ripe old age without even knowing how to apply for a stupid fucking _job_ … but the guy – and Loki has to admit he feels a little better once he learns they’re forced to go by the plenty-fucking-ridiculous-in-its-own-right title of _career programs facilitators_ \- does manage to make himself useful while somehow not coming off as judgmental or demeaning.

_Unlike Odin_ , Loki thinks, back at the time of the ill-fated College Admissions Fiasco. Yeah, yeah, he got in. It was still a fiasco by the end. And he sure as hell had felt both judged and demeaned.

Well before he’d left Casa Odinson, too.

“-stop back at the end of the day,” the facilitator is telling him, and Loki blinks. He needs to pay attention; he can mope over life with Odin any old time. “If I’m not here, just ask for your packet. And then you’ll be all set.”

Loki frowns. He knows he only zoned out for a couple of seconds and yet here he is totally confused. “All set?”

“To start,” the guy supplies, cheerfully. “The people at the shelter will be ready for you the day after tomorrow.”

~

Loki thinks he remembered to say thanks.

He’s not positive, though; he’s stuck somewhere in the clouds between elated and terrified. _It’s just kittens_ , he has to remind himself several times during the afternoon’s DBT class. _I’m good with kittens_.


End file.
